With less than a month to go for the Pitching Forum application phase to be over, we bring to you a few tips to better prepare your project submission:

Synopsis  

This small bit of your project is essential. This will be a window into your hard work and you should focus on you tell the story from beginning to end, clearly establishing the protagonist, the problem and its resolution.

Note of intent

Here you are allowed to become personal. State what drives you, why you want to see your film brought to life, why you are investing in it and also, make clear the artistic and production choices, like why is your specific team producing your specific film.

Budget

By presenting the total budget, you will give the jury a better idea of the project’s dimension. In this particular topic, you have to make sure that your budget stays realistic and, although nobody expects your value to be precise, it is essential to stay reasonable. This will b the key to showing the maturity level of your project and yourself.

Production Details

Regarding this matter, it is important to make clear if there is any funding for the film and how the production will be supported. Is your film is a book adaptation, also clarify is there is already an agreement with the author. Another relevant tip we can give you regarding this subject is that you should always try to give an idea of the distribution plans for your films or any plans you may have to grant additional endorsement.

Teaser or Trailer

Although this is not mandatory, the viewing of a teaser or trailer regarding your film is extremely useful for the jury to see some processed material and, therefore, get a better sense of the final work. In the case of documentaries, it is of the utmost importance that a brief teaser is shown, so it can be clear the kind of language that is used in the film, what footage has already been collected, how it has been ensembled and any other important references that the jury may conclude with the viewing of the teaser.

Visual References

This point is not required and we present this tip as for an extra that can differentiate your pitch from the other ones. Although it is not required for you to present your visual references or your “mood board”, this can be helpful in order to show the style and visual dynamics of your film. By presenting this, the jury can have a better idea of what inspired you and can take a better look at the aesthetics your film might have as a finalized project.

The three categories existing in the Pitching Forum are short films, feature films and documentaries and each will rely on a panel of experts that work in these fields to give you collective and private feedback about your project.

In addition to this, each category will be presented with 3 awards, to help the selected projects go further. The awards are: Post Production award, delivered in close partnership with either Halo, or Goldcrest Films or Envy Post-Production; the Mentorship award which consists in 3 month tutoring and project developing with an expert; the FEST Film Lab Award which consists on a weekend training at a FEST Film Lab workshop of the winner’s choosing; and, making a comeback this year, the Filmarket Hub award, that will allow the chosen projects to find producers and co-producers on the online platform Filmarket Hub.

FEST - Pitching Forum can be the opportunity of a lifetime to get your ideas off the ground and up and running, so long as you don’t forget to submit your project until the deadline of 1st of April. The price for submission is 60€.